Helen+Bain

On November 20, 1925, 23-year-old Helen Bain, a homemaker, died in Chicago from complications of a criminal abortion performed that day. Dr. George Slater was arrested on November 21 for Helen's death. Slater was indicted by a grand jury for homicide on May 1, 1926.

Slater was also implicated in the 1922 abortion death of Delia Campbell and the 1927 abortion death of Anna Mae Smith.

Helen's abortion was typical of criminal abortions in that it was performed by a physician. The mantra among abortion-rights organizations that before legalization, the world of abortion was a world of rusty coathangers and untrained quacks is false. In fact, it's an insult to the abortion-minded women of yesteryear to assume that they were all so mentally unhinged or utterly mindless as to reflexively reach for the rustiest knitting needle in the basket. The vast majority sought out professionals of the same caliber they'd go to for any other obstetric or gynecological issue.



Keep in mind that things that things we take for granted, like antibiotics and blood banks, were still in the future. For more about abortion in this era, see [|Abortion in the 1920s].

For more on pre-legalization abortion, see [|The Bad Old Days of Abortion].

Source:
 * [|Homicide in Chicago Interactive]

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